A Cold Snap
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: [AU] Tomoki doesn't speak anymore. His tears are silent, his bullying unnoticed. But silence can't last forever. Resentment might try. (Summary from Aiko)
1. 1

**A/N**:

The Mini-Fic Masterclass Challenge, #8 – Not-so-secret Santa (from Aiko!)  
Diversity Writing Challenge, f7 – write a drabble novel  
Becoming the Tamer King, Training Peak task  
Digimon World Dawn/Dusk Remake Challenge, Sunken Tunnel task

* * *

**A Cold Snap  
**1.

There's a boy somewhere between me and my brother in age doing magic tricks in the park.

Maybe he's just finishing off elementary school and getting the last bit of a little kid out from inside of him.

Maybe he's just started junior high school and misses it already.

Or maybe he's trying to build that illusion because he's never been the type of kid people smile with otherwise. Maybe this is just his way of pretending and maybe he doesn't have an older brother that breaks all his masks so he can't use them any more and he's run out of clay to make new ones with.

Maybe he's got just enough friends to make it through life pretending like this.

'Hey, kid in the orange hat? You want to see?'

No, I don't.

But I don't say that. I don't say anything at all.

I just leave.


	2. 2

**A Cold Snap  
**2.

'Did you like that boy doing magic tricks?'

Yutaka's trying, kind of. He keeps on missing the mark. Sometimes it's like he's playing on a totally different board.

It doesn't matter. If I wanted to talk to someone, Yutaka would be at the bottom of the list.

He didn't listen when it mattered, after all.

He sighs, now. 'Tomoki…'

I muster up my best glare, which I know is sad and pathetic and doesn't show the resentment in my heart at all.

I should hate the bullies, really. They deserve it.

I do hate the bullies.

But I hate the brother who pushed me to face them when I couldn't even move.

He's the reason things are like this now.


	3. 3

**A Cold Snap  
**3.

The bullies are like a sine wave. They grow bored with him when I don't respond to them and then they leave me alone for a bit. But then they get bored without their plaything and they come back to taunt.

I ignore them, just waiting for the time they leave again because I know they will.

They're a sine wave. Reliable. Coming and going. I can handle them so long as nothing changes. They can come and go.

Though, each time they come, they toss a few more proverbial coins into the hate jar.

Even if nothing will ever come of it.


	4. 4

**A Cold Snap  
4.**

'It'd be more fun if you played, you know.'

And that is the problem with new kids, especially the ones who naturally attract friends like a flock. And that's Kanbara Shinya.

But for me… No, it's not more fun if I play.

But I don't shake my head. I've learnt my lesson. If I ignores the other entirely, he'll go away.

It's always worked like that. Some come back, like the bullies. But no-one sticks around like a leech except his brother, and that's him trying to make up for things that can't be fixed and I really wished he wouldn't –

But that's in my hands too. All I have to do is lock the door.


	5. 5

**A Cold Snap  
5.**

Kanbara Shinya is a bully.

The proof is that he keeps on coming around, no matter how many times he's ignored. Like the bullies do.

I'm tired of it. It's a bully on time as well and between them and that and my brother's constant useless questions I wonder if I'll really crack this time.

You can only throw a nut so many times before it cracks.

Most of me doesn't want that because it's a pretty comfortable equilibrium I've found.

Another part of him is happy to let this dam inside of me finally get out.

I wonder how it had looked. A balloon finally blown past its limit so it burst and let out air – but really, what could air do?

It's still slapped aside, but at least I can choose to lock the door again.


	6. 6

**A Cold Snap  
6.**

'Tomoki.' Yutaka is knocking on my door.

Actually, aside from Yutaka knocking on my door and my parents leaving food outside it, nothing much else happens.

I don't have to deal with the bullies.

I don't have to deal with Kanbara Shinya.

It's actually better than before.

Except there's something hollow inside my chest and I don't know what's wrong.

Once upon a time, I'd silently cry behind these very doors because everyone would see but no-one would understand and no-one would help. And then Yutaka would see those red-rimmed eyes and sigh and say I don't understand other people and to just try.

I understand that some people are just plain cruel.

And there are many more people who simply don't understand other people.

And sometimes, I don't know whether Yutaka is one or both of those.

Sometimes he's both.

And those times, I hate him the most.


	7. 7

**A Cold Snap  
7.**

My suspension's over. I'm supposed to go back to school but I stay. And nobody tries to drag me out of bed.

They're stepping on eggshells around me. Even Yutaka. Yutaka's been kind of stepping on eggshells ever since the implosion and now the explosion's come and gone too and I'm running on empty.

If he returns, it won't take long to fill me up again. Like gas. In a balloon. To pop again.

Heck, with Yutaka around, it won't take long to fill me up even if I stay in bed.

'You're not being fair, Tomoki.'

Yeah, he can say that. It's easy for him to give all these little bits of useless advice because they weren't the same.

What's not fair is those bullies existing in the first place and starting it all.


	8. 8

**A Cold Snap  
8.**

I can remember exactly how it went. One of the oldest tricks in the book but lots of people honestly drop things as well and am I supposed to ignore all of those for the sake of a few fakers?

I thought not, at the time.

Apparently, a little kindness doesn't go a long way as my mother once told me. Rather, it gets trampled in the mud. And it was. Trampled in the mud.

And I was a child and embarrassed and naïve and thought I could hide it and wash it off and forget it and it wouldn't happen again.

But it did. And again. And, at some point, I realised that wasn't the case but it was too late to do anything else.


	9. 9

**A Cold Snap  
9.**

Sometimes, I wished they would hit me. Leave physical marks that couldn't be washed away by the rain or water or an accident. Sometimes, I wished they'd leave undeniable proof so others would see how brutal they were. How mean.

How I couldn't possibly change things on my own.

There's no such thing as a victim and a bully. There's a victim and a criminal, or a bully and a person who allows themselves to be bullied.

Allowing… is such a funny word.

Did I allow myself to shove Kanbara Shinya out the window?

Did he allow me to shove him?

Or were we both so surprised that neither of us could really think until it was too late. Until it was over.


	10. 10

**A Cold Snap  
10.**

It's a joke, really. They spill so much blood but because no-one ever sees, they get a slap on the wrist and that's only if someone believes me.

Someone almost dies, and I'm shut in my room for a week.

And honestly, it's a paradise.

It's a crazy world. It's not fair. It doesn't make sense.

Wasn't school supposed to brings things into perspective?

It hasn't. It's only skewered it entirely.

'He's in shock,' they say.

I'm not. Do they think I care? Of course I care. But Kanbara Shinya was a bully too and I only wished I'd done that at the beginning, so the rest hadn't followed through.


	11. 11

**A Cold Snap  
11.**

Someone gets sick of this stalemate, eventually.

Surprisingly, it's not my family. It's another boy instead, older than me and younger than my brother and with the same hair and skin and eye colour as Kanbara Shinya.

Brother, then. Or cousin or some sort of family relation.

I'm surprised the first thing he does is sock me in the jaw.

Actually, I'm not surprised. Blood begets blood in the ideal world, the dream world, and this guy's living it out.

I wonder what would have happened if Yutaka had been my knight in shining armour like he'd been meant to be.

But now I have the mark on my face I've always wanted.

And I crack again.

How lovely.


	12. 12

**A Cold Snap  
12.**

The boy is unnerved. I can see it in his face, and he's boxed in with this crazy little brat who's laughing his head off.

I'm trapped in a room with two boys both bigger than me and they can do anything and nobody's going to come and save me…

Well, now he knows how it feels.

Even if he's not the one I really want to understand how it feels.

'That was for my brother,' he says, finally.

Brother. Figures.

'Wish you were mine,' I say, and I mean it because I could've been saved by a hero then and I wouldn't have had to freeze.


	13. 13

**A Cold Snap  
13.**

Ice is tough. It's also brittle. Once it cracks, it just falls apart. Or it melts into goo if you leave it out too long or too close to the flames.

My jaw hurts now. It hurts and it keeps hurting and it's annoying. It's distracting. It makes me move it. It makes me want to go and get some ice but my legs won't move.

And my throat is screaming and wants some water but I don't want to get up for that either.

So I don't. And the knight that's not mine leaves instead, through the window.

Just like a hero from a cartoon except where's the damsel he's saved?


	14. 14

**A Cold Snap  
**14.

He's back with a glass of water. And an ice pack.

I just stare at them as he offers them. I kind of want to ask why but the word won't come.

Finally, he sighs and slaps the ice pack on my jaw.

It's sudden and cold.

It's a shock.

Yeah, all change is a shock.

'Shinya's not a bad kid,' the boy says. 'He just doesn't know when not to push, you know.'

Shinya pushed and pushed and pushed until he was pushed.

'I mean, it's karma in a sense. He pushed until someone pushed him back – but still, you're not supposed to do it literally.'

What even is this guy trying to say?

'What I'm trying to say is…' He runs a hand through his hair. 'I'm pissed. Really, I'm pissed. But you look so pathetic right now…' He shakes his head again. 'But you're not getting anywhere. You're pushing walls instead of the door.'


	15. 15

**A Cold Snap  
**15.

'You're pushing walls instead of the door.'

Why is it a complete stranger is able to tell him something more useful than his own big brother who's supposed to be an endless fountain of useful knowledge?

It's unfair but it's also the truth. Walls, and doors. I keep his door locked and maybe I'm not literally pushing at walls but I figuratively am.

I'm still not sure about Kanbara Shinya, though.

He pushed and pushed and pushed and wound up pushed. Is he the window, then? That breaks when it's pushed the wrong way but closes the right?

Then who's the door? The bullies… or his brother?


	16. 16

**A Cold Snap  
**16.

'You spoke to Kanbara-kun.'

Yutaka manages to sound confronting again. But maybe he just wants to understand.

_Too bad, Ni-san. You missed your chance._

'Tomoki…'

The door is still between us.

_You're pushing walls instead of the door._

I wonder if the bullies even are a door… or if they're a wave, that keeps on knocking me off my feet.

'Ni-san.' My voice is hoarse and my throat sore. 'I hate you.'

_Is that what you want to hear?_

There's only silence on the other side of the door.

Aside from that, nothing's changed.


	17. 17

**A Cold Snap  
17.**

I open the door.

Yutaka is still there. I expected him to have left a long time ago.

But Yutaka is still there. Still waiting for something. 'You're looking better,' he remarks.

Really, I wonder. Why is that?

'There's something in your eyes…' He shakes his head and his hair flops about. He needs to cut it – but that's an idle thought, really. He doesn't need me to tell him. 'Say it again?'

_Say what?_

'Say you hate me again,' he says, and his voice isn't that confident one that can do no wrong but manages to anyway. 'Say it again, please?'

It's easy. I do hate him, from the bottom of my heart.

'Your hair needs a trim.'

Rather, I hate him at the bottom of those water waves.

And he smiles. He's relieved. He's happy I can't say it a second time, can't mean it.

'I'm sorry.'

His voice is still kind of meek.

He's not perfect. But he means it.


	18. 18

**A Cold Snap  
18.**

Kanbara Shinya's older brother's name is Kanbara Takuya. They both show up at our house one day and Shinya's only got stitches on his head.

And Shinya's first words are: 'You didn't talk for months? Wow; now way I'm that patient.'

Our older brothers sigh. 'You've completely missed the point.'

Actually, I'm not sure which of the two said that. Doesn't really matter anyway.

Shinya is kind of like Yutaka. They say things that sound right to them but I hear them differently. And vice versa too. A lot of people are like that. And the golden rule that family is supposed to understand each other is a load of rubbish.

Maybe he still wanted his big brother to come along and fix everything.

'I'm sorry.'

His voice is still kind of meek.

He's not perfect. But he means it.


	19. 19

**A Cold Snap  
19.**

I still don't know what I'm going to do but all his barriers are broken so I have to try something new anyway.

It's all the fault of the Kanbara brothers this time. Really. Pushing until pushed. Breaking into my room – and even my family didn't do that. Helping me find where the problem is – though I think I've figured out what the door I need to push is and it boils down to the same thing Yutaka would say –

Except this time there's a Kanbara Shinya in my corner and that makes all the difference.

And maybe things would've backfired after all if it had been Yutaka instead.


	20. 20

**A Cold Snap  
20.**

Shinya stands up to his own bullies because he knows if his brother does it instead, things go south quite quickly.

They left marks, he said.

My pain didn't have any marks to escape through.

Takuya's bruise is long gone, now.

There's no easy answer. There isn't in life and sometimes we don't learn that till out of school and sometimes we learn it in there.

It's not fair. Life's not fair but we have to muddle through. We can't stay shut up in cages, self-imposed or otherwise.

We have voice-boxes. We can't stay silent. We have to talk. We have to scream.

We can't suffer and cry in silence forever and, really, I have been screaming for all I thought not to do just that.


	21. 21

**A Cold Snap  
21.**

There's a boy in the park showing off his magic tricks and Shinya thinks it's cool and silly at the same time and I think the same. Because we can see he is a little lonely on the inside, for all his smiles.

We're still standing there when he notices us. 'You in the orange hat, you wanna see this time?'

So he does remember me.

But no, I don't answer him. Not straight away. He's still a stranger and I like this new equilibrium. The sine wave's flattened out a bit. The sea's calmed. I've got a sun to keep me as liquid in a cup and I'm there to pour over him if he gets too hot.

Yutaka and I aren't a great match in siblings. Shinya and Takuya aren't either. Maybe Mother Nature got us mixed up. Or maybe all four of us needed to come together.

Or maybe we're not there yet and this is going to crack as well.

Maybe they'll get worse. Maybe they'll get better. Maybe there'll be a misunderstanding or miscommunication or words said that someone else just can't understand…

But muddling through all of that is what it means to grow up – and just sometimes, it's too soon and too fast and we can't go back.

But at other times we can. 'Sure.' My voice is still hoarse from disuse but it's getting there. 'Show us some magic tricks.'


End file.
